Last Saturday we have got another high altitude balloon launch (Number 08). The intention was to test two recovery methods and to launch the second stage of the WikiLauncher.

We have got an APRS radio link and an IRIDIUM satellite based communications attached to the balloon ramp. APRS failed in the landing but IRIDIUM worked well.

The onboard computer failed to activate the second stage ignition so we recovered the rocket together with the launch ramp and the rest of the balloon. The burst was at 33 km of altitude (108,000 ft) thus launching point should be at 32 km (105,000 ft) so we have validated the balloon as well.

Awesome! So you did a rockoon launch? How did it go other than the second stage did not fire? Did I hear that correctly? You recovered a rocket after launch and the balloon? I did not understand the whole thing. Congratulations!Much more details please! way to go WikiSat!

Oh! I see what was the problem do you know? Was it that the GPS did not send a fire signal to the rocket? Or did your ignition fail?Our system uses the GPS signal to fire the rocket from a bee line 2 meter gps/aprs tracker with a special "bee sting" and programing from Big Red Bee.

We are under burn bans all over Texas and it is holding up our progress currently. Man you almost did it! Can you fix the problem?

Yes! Good deal Josh, I'm glad you found the problem! Did you test your igniters in vacuum? They don't work well a lot of them. Rocketflite Magnalite igniters do work we know that. Good luck on your next mission.

Sure!They work in vacuum and in space, that was not the problem. The problem was the igniter connector because are reused from an old computer; they are pin jumpers. I forgot to glue it all. It was my fault but never again. Tomorrow we will do the same test but on ground to validate all these things. I will prepare a video.

That sounds great! Do you have any details on the propulsion you are using for the two stage rocket. Is it using the "Coke Zero" motors? How much impulse to you get out of those motors?

Dave

EDIT: I looked at the link in the "How's it going?" thread, and it does appear that you are using the Coke Zero motors for your space launch. Have you ground-tested or simulated this rocket. It doesn't seem like it would be able to reach space (100km) even if launched from 30km. In any case, it will be a great achievement if you can launch this from a balloon. Good luck!

We tried to measure the thrust using a weighing scale but we have not succeeded any time. We have made some simulations and the Stage2 thrust should be less than 20 kilograms of thrust (Between 209 and 35 Newtons in vaccuum depending on burn speed that we don't know yet). We are developing the nozzle:http://code.google.com/p/moon-20/wiki/W ... _subsystem

Simulations said that apogee will be between 377 and 506 km depending on burn speed (From 1 to 6 mm/s) assuming a lift off at 32 km from the balloon and a payload of 20 grams. The dry to mass ratio is 23% and spin stabilization method.